Changing Networks; Keep Same Number

At some point next week I'm changing networks. I'm going from O2 back to Vodafone but I want to keep my same number. I know its possible to do it but I'm not sure how to, how long it will take, the costs etc. Does anybody have any useful information and how to do it?

Did this actually this week myself. Rang up O2 on Tuesday afternoon asking for my PAC number, got it over the phone. Then rang Vodafone, said I wanted to transfer my number to them, said it should be ready by Thursday afternoon. Fair enough it was ready around midday and oddly enough just before then I made test phone calls with the O2 sim and the new Vodafone sim and both shared the same number, but on calling back only went to O2 (would have been interesting if both phones had gone off).

What I found interesting however is that on that same Tuesday afternoon at around 2pm I had in my hand a Vodafone Ireland sim card which I was planning to transfer my Irish mobile number from Meteor to. I called Vodafone Ireland customer services, asked for the porting department (the number given by them can't be dialled from outside the Irish Republic) and after a few minutes they said it should take 1-3 hours to transfer - and sure enough by 4pm my new Vodafone Ireland sim was ready (with €12 free credit!) and the Meteor sim was deactivated. Now if it only takes a couple of hours in Ireland to do this, why does it take a couple of days minimum in the UK?

Did this actually this week myself. Rang up O2 on Tuesday afternoon asking for my PAC number, got it over the phone. Then rang Vodafone, said I wanted to transfer my number to them, said it should be ready by Thursday afternoon. Fair enough it was ready around midday and oddly enough just before then I made test phone calls with the O2 sim and the new Vodafone sim and both shared the same number, but on calling back only went to O2 (would have been interesting if both phones had gone off).

What I found interesting however is that on that same Tuesday afternoon at around 2pm I had in my hand a Vodafone Ireland sim card which I was planning to transfer my Irish mobile number from Meteor to. I called Vodafone Ireland customer services, asked for the porting department (the number given by them can't be dialled from outside the Irish Republic) and after a few minutes they said it should take 1-3 hours to transfer - and sure enough by 4pm my new Vodafone Ireland sim was ready (with €12 free credit!) and the Meteor sim was deactivated. Now if it only takes a couple of hours in Ireland to do this, why does it take a couple of days minimum in the UK?

This may be of interest to you...

Quote:

On 17 July 2007, Ofcom released its conclusions from the review of UK MNP and mandated reduction of porting time to 2 working days with effect from 1 April 2008. On 29 November 2007, Ofcom completed its consultation on further reduction to porting time to 2 hours along with recipient led porting and mandated that near-instant (no more than 2 hours) recipient led porting be implemented by no later than 1 September 2009.

The reason it currently takes longer in the country is because there is no central database linking phone numbers to provider. When the database is in operation a port could theoretically take just a few minutes.